Junior guard Josh Bartelstein will give an inside look all season at the 2011-12 version of the Wolverines.

What's up everyone? We are officially back!

School has begun, Crisler Arena is open and most importantly, we got our new gear! Well maybe school beginning or the opening of Crisler outweighs the gear.

This past Tuesday (Sept. 6), we had our first conditioning workout with our basketball coaches present. It's been awhile since we have been all together. Later this week we will have our first individual workouts in groups of four and the cycle of a new season will be in full swing. I cannot wait!

The first thing I need to talk about is just how good Crisler Arena looks. Check out the gallery!

The sad part is nothing I say and no pictures you guys see will do justice to how good it looks. It is a complete 180. There is no college arena I have been to in my two years that looks better. The court, the railings, the seats, the lights, the floor and the scoreboard make it feel completely new.

I'm not one for hyping things up and I didn't really buy into all this Crisler hype, but trust me you guys are in for a huge surprise. If you could have seen the smile on Tim's (Hardaway Jr.) face or Corey (Person) running around the entire court you would understand just how shocked and happy everyone was.

We are just so appreciative to the university and the athletic department for doing all that they have. We all feel really lucky to be part of all of this.

Now, I must break and move onto a much less happier subject.

On Sunday, coach Meyer, Jordan (Morgan), Zack (Novak) and myself attended the White Sox/Tigers game. Zack, coach Meyer, and I are huge White Sox fans and Jordan is a real big Tigers fan. Let me backtrack just for a second so I can talk about the events of Saturday (Sept. 3). We -- the White Sox that is -- were beating the Tigers 8-1, a huge lead and one that should never be lost.

It was setting up for the biggest game of the year on Sunday night. Next thing I know, we are eating a team dinner at Pizza House and the score is 8-6 in the ninth. Then, I hear this yell from Travis (Conlan), coach Alexander and Jordan -- three of the biggest Tiger fans you can find. I went into a complete shell and no longer ate my BBQ chicken as I was actually sick to my stomach -- 9-8 final, the Sox blew it.

So now I go to the game Sunday thinking this cannot get any worse and I am just going to enjoy a nice baseball game. I was very wrong. Well, let's just say 18 Tiger runs and three White Sox errors later I wasn't really enjoying the game. It was like watching the Bad News Bears. To make matters even worse, I have to let Jordan paint my face like a Tiger because I made a bet when we were losing 5-0 that there was no way we would be down 10-0 - I clearly lost that one. The moral of the story is that it really sucked being a White Sox fan this weekend. Period.

Okay transitioning back, there is no question we have a lot of fun off the court and that sure didn't change on Monday night. We had the athletic center Welcome Back BBQ where all the athletes get together to kick off another year.

Besides the spectacular food, we had some amazing dancing by two of our freshmen -- the one and only Sai (Tummala) and the great Carlton (Brundidge) were asked to break it down by our captains. Sai was supposed to do the "Dougie" and Carlton attempted to do the "Macarena." I'm not really sure how to explain what either of them actually did, but Sai contorted his body in a way I had never seen and Carlton really broke down the Macarena. (Click on the above links to see what they were really supposed to do.) All video of them has yet to be found!

It is a good thing both are really good at basketball because neither will be appearing on Dancing with Stars anytime soon.

Lastly, this weekend is the start of the Michigan Basketball fantasy football league.